Mass arrests at Keystone protest

More than 300 anti-Keystone XL protesters were arrested Sunday afternoon outside the White House in the latest push by environmentalists to convince the Obama administration to reject the Canadian oil pipeline.

The student-led protest, organized by XL Dissent, started with a rally at Georgetown University. The students marched from there to the White House — with a stop at Secretary of State John Kerry’s house along the way.

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Students from 80 colleges participated in Sunday’s event, and another protest will be held on Monday in San Francisco, said Aly Johnson-Kurts, a freshman at Smith College and one of the organizers of the event.

“The youth really understand the traditional methods of creating change are not sufficient … so we needed to escalate,” said Johnson, shortly before she was arrested at the White House.

An organizer estimated the crowd at about 1,200 people. U.S. Park Police could not immediately provide a count of those arrested Sunday afternoon.

Organizers held civil disobedience training on Saturday to ensure that the demonstration went peacefully.

The crowd marched down H Street, holding banners and chanting songs. Some wore painter’s scrubs with black paint on them — “hazmat suits” with oil — while others held signs with slogans like “Keystone XL: pipeline to hell” and “Keep your oil out of my soil.”

A tide of energy undulated through the crowd as speaker after speaker got up to encourage them to risk arrest.

“I want you to know how important what you’re doing is,” Chris Wahmhoff, a member of the Michigan Coalition Against Tar Sands and candidate for the U.S. Senate, told the crowd, holding a block of oil sands in his hand. “The sick people in Michigan, the sick people in Canada, they’re looking to you.”

“They say we are too young to make a difference, but we are proving them wrong, right here, right now,” Earthguradians Youth Director Xiuhtezcatl Martinez said to the cheering crowd.

“I think when the public sees college students coming out and getting arrested,” he said to POLITICO later, “people can say the youth came out. We were here. Because our generation will be the most impacted by whatever decision is made by the government.”

The crowd rushed from the grass and toward the White House gates, where U.S. Park Police horses and police buses and vans waited at the ready. The crowd pushed toward the sidewalk as protestors took plastic zip ties and secured themselves to the White House fence. Still others stood next to them, holding banners and singing call and response chants.

“Hey, Obama, we don’t want no pipeline drama,” the activists yelled.

Amid the crowd of students, many sporting “No KXL” T-shirts, was one woman dressed as environmental superhero, Captain Planet. Activists at Lafayette Square Park unfurled a black tarp and about 50 people laid down on the sidewalk creating a “human oil spill.”

From the side, volunteers threw plastic lobsters, fish and birds — all painted black — amid the spill. One person held a sign as he lay on the pavement: “The oil is still here and so are we.”

Officers blockaded the scene, moving spectators to the park sidewalk as first horses, and then vans moved in front of the protesters.

For many of the students, this was their first time being arrested. Others said they just wanted to be a part of the rally to show solidarity and to make their voices heard.

“We get stuck in our worlds at school and we need to start being really people on the weekends and doing things you care about,” said Julie Xia, a student at Amherst College. “We talk about living lives of consequence at school. We have to try to do it.”

But did they think President Barack Obama would heed the messages being yelled at him from the streets below?

“I’m not that confident,” said Miranda Willson, a Tufts freshman, citing the criticism that Obama would receive for denying the project amid continuing economic concerns.

“But we wouldn’t be here if we didn’t have hope,” Ilana Hamer, another Tufts freshman chimed in. “So hopefully, it makes an impact.”